I have recently received complaints that the recounting of my recent CHP encounter is most infuriating due
to the notable absence of a citation and fine.

To those people I say, “OK, fine, but let me tell you about the time
Boston decided that I had been delinquent in paying hundreds of dollars
in excise tax on my car, and had informed me that they would impound it
if they saw it. They were right; I hadn’t paid any of that tax. (But I
had also MOVED AWAY the year before.) It took about a year and a half, and
several hundred dollars, all told, to get them to stop trying to collect taxes
on my California-registered car.”